Alexander Tyler and Democracy

In 1887 Alexander Tyler, a Scottish history professor at the University of Edinburgh, observed the following about the fall of the Athenian Republic some 2,000 years earlier:

“A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government.

A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury.

From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse over loose fiscal policy, (which is) always followed by a dictatorship.”

When we consider the state of the World Economy, the Syrian Refugee crisis, the 2016 race for the Whitehouse (USA), and our own Canadian Liberal Government.  Do wee see any two thousand year old patterns developing ???